What Are The Gobshites Saying These Days?

Welcome back to our weekly survey of the state of Our National Dialogue which, as you know, is what Donizetti would have come up with, had he composed Lucia di Tackhammermoor.

As much as I would rather not, we have to begin with Our Lady Of The Magic Dolphins, who took everyone on This Week With The Clinton Guy Shocked By Blowjobs on a wild ride through the dips and ravines and canyons of her mind. Meanwhile, Congressman Keith Ellison, who plainly is not accustomed to dealing with this level of industrial-strength ka-ray-zee even though he works in the current House Of Representatives, kept hollering vainly from the actual physical universe.

NOONAN: Just quickly, I think the Republicans right now are doing something very quietly that I think I would love to see the Democrats doing. Republicans, senators, governors, are actually talking about governance. They're talking about ideas to change America, to bring the economy back.

I see the Democrats not doing that, not doing ideas, not doing the formulations...

STEPHANOPOULOS: Let me bring in...

(CROSSTALK)

ELLISON: -- the government...

(CROSSTALK)

ELLISON: -- 16 days...

NOONAN: Oh, come on.

ELLISON: They almost threatened to default on the deficit. I mean they've been doing a lot of bad things. But you have to...

NOONAN: I am not hearing ideas...

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Why are the canaries screaming, Clarice?

(It's important to note that the show was pretty good prior to their trotting out the Powerhouse Panel, a name that ABC copped from a weekly meeting of the Business Roundtable of Bartlesville, Oklahoma. This should say something about the value of such panels, but probably won't.)

Oddly enough, the ABC crew barely touched upon the explosive situation at the Veterans Administration, an actual scandal out of which not much hay has been made thus far. They were far more interested in Bloody Bill Kristol's blithering-idiot routine concerning the defenestration of Jill Abramson at the New York Times.

ELLISON: ...Jill Abramson this way, what about the other women? What about the younger journalists? What about -- you know, I mean, it's a real problem. And it's sort of a symbol...

KRISTOL: Who is the they? Who is the they who is treating her that way? Arthur Sulzberger, Mr. Liberal, Mr. Democrat, Mr. Politically Correctness...

When the Times was helping to gin up Kristol's pet war, I suspect his opinion of Sulzberger was both different, and far better in a grammatical sense. Anyway, over on CBS, they were all over the VA, with former Toussaint L'Ouverture embed Bob Schieffer sending out Major Garrett to grill White House chief of staff Denis McDonough on the burgeoning scandal.

MAJOR GARRETT: Let me ask you about the President himself, you've described scars that you have from the President, from his anger based on briefings you've given him, well what has the public heard from the President? It's been nearly three weeks since the President has commented on this publicly and I want to take that period of time, almost three weeks, nothing from the president publicly...Where's the president been?

DENIS McDONOUGH: The president, the president has been, an active voice for increased resources and reform at the veterans administration since he joined the veterans committee in the Senate over, 7, 8, 9 years ago and he will continue to do that.

MAJOR GARRETT: But I'm talking about a specific issue?

DENIS McDONOUGH: and he will continue to go out and he will continue to talk, as he did in Asia, in response to questions and throughout the course of his administration, we'll continue to fight for reform, continue our fight for performance and we'll put his money-the money of the United States government-where his mouth is.

The administration is completely wrong-footed on this business, and McDonough knows it, and Garrett knew that McDonough knew it. This is the kind of interview that happens less and less on The Sunday Showz. This is also why Schieffer's show is leading the ratings for this particular genre even though he is still working on his mammoth memoir of his days covering the War Of Jenkins Ear. Meanwhile, Disco Dave's Disco Dance Party, the Dancin' Master hosted wingnut non-candidate Doctor Ben Carson, who did not disappoint, dishing up some fresh roast loon with his own special Incredible Awesomesauce.

GREGORY: But you said it is slavery, in a way, because it is making us all subservient to the government.

CARSON: Right. And--

GREGORY: That's what you said.

CARSON: And I said, "In a way." In a way, anything is slavery that robs you of your ability to control your own life. And when you take the most important thing that you have, which is your health care, and you put that in the hands of government bureaucrats, I think you have done the wrong thing. And as I was about to say, you go back and you look at the neo-Marxist literature, and look at what they say. You don't have to listen to what I say about taking control of health care of a populace and making the people dependent.

I, myself, am at work, editing a volume of horror stories regarding the people who died during the Middle Passage to the DMV. After that, I will return to my extensive research into how the family structure is regularly shattered when children are sold off in the process of obtaining a fishing license. I mean, Lord above, can't we wait for this guy to announce before we let him catapult this gibberish into the public discourse?